MLG Summer Championship Wrap-Up

This past weekend was interesting for eSports fans. Raleigh was full of scandal, disqualification, nearly undefeated victories, back and forth championship matchups, and hundreds of hours of eSports goodness.

*Spoilers Ahead*

StarCraft II

Though StarCraft II player Leenock took first place in the MLG tournament, walking away with a cool $25,000, his accomplishment was dwarfed by the Canadian player Scarlett. Scarlett proved herself to be one of the best North American StarCraft II players by taking first place nearly undefeated (only losing one game to TheOgnis) in the World Championship Series North American Finals that were also held at MLG’s Summer Championship. Not only does this mean she won $40,000 in prize money, but she also will be able to go to Shanghai in November to compete in Blizzard’s World Championship Series Tournament which will see representatives from numerous countries competing to be crowned the StarCraft II World Champion.

Mortal Kombat and Soul Calibur V

Mortal Kombat suffered from an upset in the championship game when favorite to win CDjr lost 2-4 to OBS_EMP_REO in a great Kung Lao vs Kabal matchup. Soul Calibur V came down to a mirror matchup between Ramon TSF and Xephukai with both playing Pyrrha, with Xephukai barely pulling out the victory. Xephukai and REO walked away with $6,000 each.

League of Legends

There were some fantastic games played by the League of Legends teams at MLG Raleigh event, but these were largely overshadowed by a game fixing scandal that came to light during the championship games and resulted in MLG disqualifying both Curse and Dignitas and splitting the first and second place prize pools between third through sixth place. Riot Games decided to deny both teams points toward placement in the Season 2 League of Legends Circuit.

Many conflicting accounts of events have been espoused by the different sides involved, making it difficult to determine what actually happened. What is clear is that Curse and Dignitas conferred before the championship and decided to play an All Random All Mid (ARAM) game. After that, accounts begin to contradict. MLG claims that Dignitas and Curse colluded to split the prize money and throw the match. Curse apologized for planning the ARAM, but denied planning to split the prize. Dignitas admitted that some of the allegations were valid, but not which ones. Riot also released a statement clarifying that they did not strip the circuit points because of the ARAM game, but because of the alleged collusion between the two teams.

I couldn't watch the finale cause it was too late for me but I think Leenock deserves it. He played pretty good in the previous matches.

And as for Scarlett I'm very excited to see a female player compete interenationally, however, CreatorPrime will take the tournament anyways :D 4-1 agains Squritle.....? My face was like :O when I saw those two BO3s..